First time you open the application the application settings will be shown.

In the settings menu different parameters can be set from which the daylight calculations will be made. To enter the settings menu again click the settings button in the upper right corner of the Daylight application. 

A new popup window will open in which the following parameters can be set:



Calculation Standard

Selection which local standard you would like to use for daylight area calculation, simplified method. According to this selection the content and the calculation of the daylight application will be changed.

  • Danish Building Regulations § 379 Daylight
    Regulations according to "Bygningsreglementet.dk Dagslys (§ 379)" part will be applied. Daylight factors will be calculated according to Bygningsreglementets vejledning om korrektioner til 10 pct.-reglen for dagslys.
    Therefore in the Window table, extra columns, like F;OMG, F;OH, F;SF etc. will be added stating the different calculated daylight factors. A daylight calculation per room is advised.
    The default required 1% Daylight Factor will be applied to the rooms requiring daylight.
    Read more about using this regulation >>>
  • Swedish Boverket's building regulations § 6.322 daylight SS 914201
    Regulations according to "Boverkets byggregler § 6.322 Dagsljus" will be applied. The Alpha angle for surrounding buildings and factor will be calculated. Balcony are will be added to the living room area. Whereas the conditions for the room and windows will be checked. A daylight calculation per room is advised.
    This simplified method cannot be used for bigger, more complex rooms.
    The default required 1% Daylight Factor will be applied to the rooms requiring daylight.
    Read more about using this regulation >>>
  • Norwegian building regulations § 13-7. Light b. for dwelling units
    Regulations about "TEK17 Byggteknisk forskrift § 13-7" will be applied. The glass LT value will be used, and the balcony area above the room will be added to the living room area. Whereas the conditions for the room and windows will be checked. A daylight calculation per room is advised. This simplified method can only be used for residential buildings, where surrounding buildings do not give too much shading on the windows.
    The default required 2% Daylight Factor will be applied to the rooms requiring daylight.
    Read more about using this regulation >>>
  • Finnish Environmental Decree Section 5
    Regulations according to "Ympäristöministeriön asetus 5 §" will be applied. The 10% daylight window-to-floor ratio will be applied and checked. For each window the maximum distance and angle of opposite shading obstructions will be checked.
    Read more about using this regulation >>>
  • Dutch Building Decree Section 3.11. Daylight NEN 2057
    Regulations according to "Bouwbesluit Afdeling 3.11. Daglicht NEN 2057" will be applied. This includes a calculation for Alpha and Bèta shading angles, which will be automatically converted into a shading reduction factor. For the application of usable floor area and "krijtstreepmethode", a daylight calculation per area is advised.
    The default required 1% Daylight Factor will be applied to the rooms requiring daylight.
    Read more about this regulation >>>
  • None
    No calculation standard will be applied. And just plain window-to-floor calculation will be applied, where you can set your custom minimum window-to-floor area.


Daylight Area Calculation per

You can run a daylight calculation for window-to-floor and window-to-wall ratios per room, per space, per floor and per area plan. If selecting one of these, make sure you have defined all rooms, spaces, areas in your Revit model.

  • Rooms
    A spatial relation between a room and surrounding glazing panels will be found by the daylight application. As a result window-to-floor are per room will be listed.
  • Space
    A spatial relation between a space and surrounding glazing panels will be found by the daylight application. As a result window-to-floor are per space will be listed.
  • Floor
    A spatial relation between a room and surrounding glazing panels will be found by the daylight application. So rooms are required for this option. As a result window-to-floor are per floor level will be listed, whereas the interior windows between two rooms will be excluded. This is best for evaluating the building envelope. 
  • Area Gross Building
    A spatial relation between an area element by Revit area scheme "Gross Building" (default area plan) and surrounding glazing panels will be found by the daylight application. As a result window-to-floor are per area will be listed.
  • Area Rentable (amongst others)
    Similar to "Area Gross Building", but with other area scheme name. Other area scheme names will be listed if available in the Revit project.


Glazing materials

Set the name(s) of the glazing materials used in your project. The text is comma separated, and case insensitive. If the name of the Revit material contains this text, the glazing panels defined with this material will be included in the daylight calculation.

It is advised to use the same names of the glazing as being defined in the Revit material list, or use word segments of the full material name. Add missing materials by adding comma separated text, to support more glazing materials.
Default values are: "glass, glas, glazed, glazing, transparent, transparant, vitrage, стекло"

Daylight area will not be calculated if no glazing materials are set, or other glazing material names are set than applied in the Revit project.


Spandrel (solid) materials

In this section you can add any name of material that needs to be extracted from the glazing area that are not window frames. More specifically, materials that are placed behind any transparent material or glazing material that results in less daylight entering a room. See below images for further visual explanation of the differences between the transparent and solid area of the window.

Read more on Calculation method, spandrel materials>>


Balconies

Here you can set a list of balcony room names. The text is comma separated, and case insensitive. If the name of the room, space, or area contains one of these comma separated text values, the room will be considered as a "balcony type room" being exterior area. In this case the window(s) between a regular room and a balcony room will be counted as exterior objects. The balcony room will not be listed in daylight, as it is actually a virtual, external room.

Read more on Calculation method, balconies>>


Daylight area starts at

Set the minimum height above floor. All area (partially) of the glazing panels below this height will be excluded.
For the Norwegian, Swedish standard, this value is set to 800 mm.

For the Danish standard, this value is set to 0 mm, so that all glass is counted.

For the Dutch standard, this value will be set to 600 mm.

Read more on calculation methods>>


Glazing bead width

The thickness (length value) of the window frame which you want to exclude from the glazing area. The glazing panel boundary polygon will be offset by this length value. The resulting area of the offset will be extracted from the total glazing area, around the entire frame. This is an optional value, where default value is 0 mm.



Maximum distance glass to surface

With this option you can set the maximum distance between the room boundary and the glazing panels . When this option is set to 600 mm, all windows with glazing panels within the distance of 600 mm from the room will be taken and windows surrounding the room. 

This value will also be used as the maximum distance between the glazing panels and the spandrel panels. If spandrel panels are further away than this distance, they will not be found and therefore not be subtracted from the glazing area.

Read more on Calculation method>>


Important note: When the value of the maximum distance glass to surface is set to 0, the Gross glas area and the Net glass area will be 0.00. To make sure all glass area is being calculated a value of >0 is needed.  And where the surface is by the room or area face.

Distance Shading Objects (min/max)

For finding the shading objects surrounding the building, a minimum and maximum distance can be set.

By settings these distance values, any objects opposite the window, closer than the minimum distance and further away than the maximum distance will be ignored. We recommend to set min 600 mm and max 300.000 mm (300 meters). Change these values in case you would like to include objects very close to the window, of beyond 300 meters from the window.

This min/max value have effect to the following calculations:

  • Norwegian standard (to check if there is not too much obstructions, adds a comment to the window in case too many obstructions are found)
  • Swedish shading factor
  • Danish F;OMG. (It has no impact to the other shading factors.)
  • Finnish (to check if there is not too much obstructions, adds a comment to the window in case too many obstructions are found)

Include Transparency Ratio

Option to include the transparency ratio of the glazing material. Also called visual light transmittance, LT, and LTA. Transparency ratio can be defined by one of two Revit values:

This value can only be used when calculation standard is set to Norwegian, Danish, Dutch, or None.

Don't confuse light transparency with energy transparency (g factor), where light transparency defines the ratio of light being transmitted, and energy transparency defines the ratio of radiance (solar energy) being transmitted.

Read more on Calculation method, transparency ratio>>


Include interior glazing

Option to include or exclude interior glazing to the glazing area calculation. Interior glazing is defined where two (or more) rooms in either directions are adjacent. This option need to be disabled when you only wish to calculate the building envelope. This option can only be changed when calculation standard is set to "none".

Read more on Calculation method>>



Daylight Factor Settings

Daylight Factor has its specific settings tab. See Calculating Daylight Factor for more information about these settings.


App Settings, application language

In order to change the language of the Daylight application you need to first click on "Settings" then click on the upper tab that indicates "App Settings". Once you reach the App Settings window you are left with the follow options, that re located under a drop down-menu next to "Application Language".


Where "Same as Revit" allows you to change the language of the Xinaps application to that similar to your Revit work environment. This is the default value.

Once done selecting the "Application Language" click "Ok". You might restart (save and close) the plug-in to completely change the application language. There is no need to restart Revit.